Holy hologram!

12/01/10

In response to our article about the holographic universe and physicist Craig Hogan’s proposed holometer experiment at Fermilab, we received a letter and poem from Harley White, who lives in Granada, Spain. She wrote:

Hello,

After reading some articles about the holographic noise experiments, I was spurred to write a poem. Although my knowledge of physics is miniscule (perhaps a little less so than that famed Planck unit), my inspiration was astronomical enough to cause the following composition.

Warm regards and good luck!
Harley White

Holy Hologram!

Say we dwell
In a 3-D projection
That truly is 2-D
Though hidden by scale,

String-theoried along
In our quantized vale
Where time dances quaintly
O'er space hill and dale,

Then reality isn't
At all as it seems
But more like the visions
Segueing in dreams—

Weird warped, yet truth fabricked
Such stuff conjectures are made on
A universe still in conception
Oho hologram!—

While headlong we lumber
Mistake wake and slumber
Spin webs from thin air
Sing ho for the life...

Hogan appreciated the poem, which we forwarded to him. Responding by e-mail, he commented, "What's nice about this is that the poet seems truly inspired by the poetry of the physics itself."